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The article is available here, though it looks like one has to pay to read it. If any one wants to subscribe or can find "Economic Inquiry" at a university library, a critique would be appreciated. I'm also pretty sure Roberts's article was also posted last month under another title. Does anyone have the link?

From the abstract and Roberts's article McGuire and Van Cott's work seems to be based on a logical fallacy. One can imagine that if the country split apart today, each fragment would draft laws and shape a constitution to reflect particular views on the issues of the day. But that would not prove that those issues had caused the split.

"Cause" is a tricky thing. An issue like the tariff may have contributed to worsening tensions or even swayed some people to take up one side or another. But left alone, the tariff question would never have brought war. Indeed, it could have been easily resolved, had slavery not embittered the situation. A list of differences between societies may not be a list of causes for a conflict between them. "Causes" have to have real explanatory force and power.

Another problem is the vagueness of the provision cited in the Confederate Constitution. If what's been posted here is true, the Confederacy retained the sugar tariff, which was clearly intended "to promote or foster" sugar growing. Therefore, a lot depends on how one reads, "any branch of industry." Does "industry" mean "production" of any kind, or does it refer to manufacturing, as opposed to agriculture?

In any event, there's a problem with the view of the Confederacy as idealistically free trade or committed to lower taxes. It may merely be that an agrarian region was opposed to taxes that would benefit industry, rather than to high taxes in general.

If any one wants to subscribe or can find "Economic Inquiry" at a university library, a critique would be appreciated.

I picked up a copy of it today from a library. It essentially makes three points.

First - they argue that the south recognized how a rudimentary concept of the Laffer curve worked when it came to taxation. They argue that the concept was at least known prior to the war, and that it made its way into confederate policy, confederate tariffs, and the confederate constitution. Their evidence is mostly a matter of referenced fact.

Second - they argue the theory of the laffer curve and how it would apply in the case of the tariff issue. This part is economic theory.

Third - they argue that the tariff issue was more prominent in secession's causes than many historians hold and point to various events demonstrating this. Among the items they point to are historical tariff rates spiking upward after the Morrill bill, the actuality of the Morrill bill's pre-war introduction and the clear sectional split over it in the House before the election, the GOP and northern endorsement of the tariff, and the tariff issue's prominence during the drafting of the confederate constitution. This last part is based heavily on notes and letters about the drafting by one of the delegates.

The article does not conclusively declare the tariff to be the sole issue nor did it ever intend to. It does demonstrate that it was an issue, some of the economic implications of it as an issue, and reason for its greater consideration as a cause in secession than has been afforded in recent years.